Monosomic Analysis of Fatty Acid Composition in Embryo Lipids of ZEA MAYS L.

The effects of monosomy of specific chromosomes on the fatty acid composition of maize embryos were studied. A novel technique was developed to obtain fatty acid profiles of single embryos without reducing the viability of the sampled kernels. Monosomic 2 embryos had significantly more oleic acid and significantly less linoleic acid than diploid control embryos. Since the conversion of oleic acid to linoleic acid is a single-enzyme-mediated reaction, we suggest that a gene involved in linoleic acid biosynthesis is located on chromosome 2. Additional consistent variations were found in other monosomic types. This study demonstrates that monosomic analysis can be used to study gene dosage effects at the biochemical level.